


Home Boys

by HenryMercury



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Food, Gen, Incidental Drarry, M/M, Soft Boys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-11
Updated: 2017-12-11
Packaged: 2019-02-13 09:47:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12981438
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HenryMercury/pseuds/HenryMercury
Summary: Mum always said plants don't belong indoors, but Dudley saw it on an episode of some TV program about houses once while he was bunking off a lunch with Aunt Marge, pretending to feel sick. He thought it looked cool—dark green leaves spilling over lots of white-painted wood, vines hung up on the walls like streamers at a party. It seemed kind of rugged, like living in the wilderness, except at the same time you could have a nice bathroom and a comfy bed and a proper kitchen with a full fridge.





	Home Boys

**Author's Note:**

  * For [aibidil](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aibidil/gifts), [zeitgeistic (faire_weather)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/faire_weather/gifts), [PukingPastilles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PukingPastilles/gifts), [gracie137](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gracie137/gifts), [carpemermaid](https://archiveofourown.org/users/carpemermaid/gifts).



> "An addition to the Grudders Anthology"

1.

Dudley's still a bit surprised to be going to college, honestly, but his wrestling got him a scholarship to a place his parents made him apply for. Dad calls it a _very reputable institution_. Dudley doesn't much care so long as he gets to keep wrestling. His close friends from Smeltings have either gone into labouring or helping with family businesses, and they don't have much time for the fun stuff anymore.

The other good thing about going to college is that he gets to move out. He's been thinking about it since the day he realised Harry was never going to come back; thinking about what it would be like out there making his own way. He's pictured not a room or two but a _house_ of his own, with nice framed posters of his favourite athletes on the living room walls and cool plants decorating the corners and surfaces, and he's _wanted_ it. Wanted a home that's his at least as much as it's anyone else's, the way Four Privet Drive will always be his parents' most of all.

Mum's always said plants don't belong indoors, but Dudley saw it on an episode of some TV program about houses once while he was bunking off a lunch with Aunt Marge, pretending to feel sick. He thought it looked cool—dark green leaves spilling over lots of white-painted wood, vines hung up on the walls like streamers at a party. It seemed kind of rugged, like living in the wilderness, except at the same time you could have a nice bathroom and a comfy bed and a proper kitchen with a full fridge.

Earlier, over the roast lamb, Marge had been talking about some poofters she'd seen in the supermarket: they'd been holding hands and bickering about what biscuits to get like they really fancied themselves _normal people_. It gave Dudley a feeling like déjà vu, when his fists curled around the crisply ironed corners of the napkin on his lap. He must have had a dream once that Aunt Marge blew up like a big angry balloon and almost floated off into the sky for good. Or... Dudley didn't know if wizards had a way of making you forget things had really happened, but he thought it would make sense for them to have that, since they kept themselves secret. Maybe Marge had said one of the kinds of things she always said, especially to Harry, and Harry had cast a spell on her.

Usually Marge was nice to him, but Dudley wanted to be able to cast a spell at her right then. Since he couldn't, he did the next best thing and told the table he was feeling too queasy for dessert. No one would doubt the seriousness of his illness, given how demanding his sweet tooth still was.

That was when he came across the house-plant show. It was also when he knew for sure that he had to go somewhere else soon. Flicking lazily through one of his magazines, he eyed the pictures of blokes with their shirts off and their muscles all oiled like they'd just come out of the gym. Dudley knew most fit strong men didn't look like these ones did, with muscle definition pulling their skin tight, but that didn't mean he liked the look of them less, just that he wouldn't necessarily pick them for his wrestling team.

Since he'd picked up his first mag with blokes in it a couple of years ago—at that point playing it off as a joke even in his own head—he'd only been finding them steadily more attractive. It wasn't going away—and it didn't feel like anything bad in the privacy of his own room, so he didn't try too hard to make it go.

He just knew it'd feel wrong coming out of his mouth anywhere Mum and Dad could hear it.

Dudley knows his parents love him, and that they usually pretend not to notice the ways he messes up, but this is different. This is the kind of thing they don't forgive people for, the kind of thing they locked Harry in the cupboard under the stairs for. This is him not being _normal_.

 _I'll tell 'em_ , he promised himself that day, _just not 'til I've got somewhere else to go._

So even though Dudley doesn't care very much what's going to be in his Business classes, he plans to put as much effort into them as he can. He'll keep earning a place somewhere beyond Privet Drive: a place that's _his_ so nobody can kick him out of it for being him.

 

2.

Dudley's first boyfriend, Stephen, only lasts him a couple of months. They're both first year students fresh out of the closet, both shite at talking about things, both shite at scheduling so that they can spend time together between all their other commitments. There are so many commitments at college. Dudley's not even sure where they've all come from.

Dudley and Stephen are in the process of breaking up, as it happens, when none other than Harry Potter walks into the biscuit aisle of Sainsbury's.

Dudley's given up trying to find him, since he's not in the phone book and they don't exactly have any mutual friends, so he immediately turns away from Stephen and shouts, "Harry!" before his cousin can run off.

"Dudley," Harry acknowledges him, sounding neutral.

"It's good to see you," Dudley says earnestly. "I wanted to get in touch, but I didn't know how."

Harry's surprise shows on his face. His face, which is even more scarred than it used to be, and also squarer with more flesh filling it out. He looks good. Much healthier than he used to.

"Oh," he says. "Er, what did you want to say?"

It's then that Dudley notices the skinny blond guy standing just behind Harry, eyeing Dudley like he's trying to stab him with his eyes. He's probably a wizard too, Dudley thinks, and hopes that wizards can't actually stab people just by looking at them really hard.

"Sorry, for a start." The answer falls out of Dudley's mouth much more easily than he's expecting. "And I hoped maybe we could stay in touch from now on. Talk. My life's changed a bit since you knew me. _I've_ changed a bit. Quite a lot, even."

Harry's quiet, but after a few moments of deliberation he gives Dudley a nod. "Sure, whatever. I'll give you my number and we can go from there."

Dudley grins, even as he registers Stephen stomping off in a huff.

" _Don't_ call me," he bites out as he goes.

Dudley doesn't bother to answer; he wasn't going to call anyway.

Harry's eyebrows jump up under the messy fringe of hair that hangs down all around his face. "Who was that?" he asks.

"My boyfriend," Dudley explains, then clarifies: "well, ex-boyfriend now."

"Boy— you're kidding, right? You don't expect me to believe you're _gay_?"

Dudley frowns at him. "I am, so yeah, I do expect you to believe it. Why shouldn't you?"

"But you're. You were always..."

"Perfect in the eyes of Mum and Dad?" Dudley guesses. "One of the people who gave you a hard time for being different? I know. Doesn't mean I can't be different too, as it's turned out."

The blond man with Harry lets out a snort at Dudley's words, and he's ready to be offended; he's said his bit quite well, in his own opinion, and he won't be made fun of by some posh-looking wanker.

But Harry turns to look at the blond over his shoulder and says, "Sound familiar, Draco?" with a happy, affectionate little smirk of an expression the likes of which Dudley's never seen on his face before, despite them living together for years and years.

"Not at all," says Draco—definitely a wizard name—in a voice even posher than Dudley was expecting from him. Then he hangs one of his arms over Harry's shoulder, wrapping the other one around Harry's waist and fiddling casually with a belt loop on the waistband of his jeans.

Dudley stares. "You told me _I_ couldn't be gay when _you're_ —?"

"Bi," Harry fills in. "Yeah. S'pose it was a bit narrow-minded of me, sorry."

This Draco bloke—Harry's boyfriend or something like it, apparently—is a very pretty man when his stare isn't full of knives. He's not Dudley's personal cup of tea, but he and Harry make quite a pair, the one all dark and messy while the other's all pale and sharp.

"Bi. Good for you, eh." The words aren't coming so easily anymore.

"What do Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon think?"

"They're not thrilled," Dudley replies. "Not the time or place for the rest of that conversation though."

"Right, yeah," says Harry, levity underpinned by grim understanding. "We'll get lunch and finish it. Sound okay?"

"Yeah," Dudley says. Lunch sounds better than okay.

 

3.

They've been talking regularly for about six months by the time Harry invites Dudley over to his house. It's the weirdest bloody place Dudley's ever been, and it's full of some of the weirdest people, but there's a tingle of excitement in him despite how intimidating the whole scene is.

"You should have seen the place before I helped him revive it," Draco tells Dudley when he notices him taking in the old-fashioned, stuffy-looking décor.

Dudley's already decided he's going to bring Harry plants for the house the next time he visits. He wasn't sure what to bring this time, so he just got a box of danishes from his favourite bakery near campus. They've gone down well, especially with Harry's freckly redhead friend Ron, and Ron's sister Ginny.

"Normally, Malfoy," Ron says through a mouthful, "I'd say you were taking too much credit. But not this time. We were going _spare_ watching him wallow in bad memories and decades of dust. He'd never have done anything about it if he hadn't wanted to impress you."

Harry glares at Ron, but laughs. They all laugh, and Dudley laughs along, swept up in the mood.

Harry's given him some wine, because he isn't game to try whatever most of the others are drinking; the stuff looks like whiskey, but after a mouthful the drinker breathes out smoke like they've dragged from a cigarette. Dudley's refilling his glass when the fireplace leaps from crackle to roar, the room is thrown momentarily into greenish light, and a man steps out of the fireplace. It all happens a lot more elegantly than the time when Harry's weird Weasley friends came to take him away from Privet Drive that one summer, and Dudley ate a magical toffee and was nearly smothered by his own tongue.

"Sorry I'm late," the new arrival says in a voice that's low and gruff but still soft somehow. Big but gentle.

The man's demeanour, when Dudley turns to look at him, gives the same impression. He's dressed in black jeans and a pale pink button-down shirt patterned by tiny red dots. He's got a white scarf wrapped around his neck that's so fluffy Dudley almost asks if he can stroke it. His short brown hair is close-cut at the sides but the top growth flops down over his forehead a bit. His face is clean-shaven, and rectangular but not too hard around the edges. There's a large bag in his hand which must logically be the source of the warm cinammony scent that's filled the room since he got here.

"If you brought gingerbread then you're forgiven," calls Pansy, the pale scary-looking girl who keeps running her long pointed fingernails through Ginny's hair and leaving faint smudges of dark purple lipstick on her neck just beneath her ear.

"Thanks for that, Pans, because I _do_ have gingerbread. Where should I put it?"

"In here'll do," Ron gestures to his open mouth. Ginny takes the opportunity to drop a mini-cheddar into it and Ron almost chokes. Dudley can't help but laugh at the look on his face.

Harry waves his wand lazily and says something Dudley can't make out, and a silver tray flies into his hand from around the corner where the kitchen must be.

"Here you are, Greg," he says, handing the tray to the man who's brought the gingerbread. "This is my cousin Dudley, by the way—I mentioned the other night that I'd be inviting him. He'll definitely enjoy your cooking."

Greg tips the biscuits carefully onto the platter, then approaches Dudley with a hand outstretched. "Greg Goyle," he introduces himself. His eyes are brown and bright as he smiles. He's a few inches taller than Dudley and almost as broad. Definitely strong, judging by the way his shirt sleeves pull over his upper arms, and the firm, inviting grip of his handshake.

"Dudley Dursley."

"Matching alliteration!" crows a woman's voice behind Dudley. He doesn't turn around to see who's made the observation. Whoever she is, she sounds like she's a few drinks ahead of Dudley, and he's had four generous glasses of white.

"So Harry says you're in college," Greg lets go of Dudley's hand, but makes it clear he wants to keep talking even while he gravitates to one of the studded, velvet-covered settees on the edge of the room.

"Business major," Dudley confirms. "I also wrestle."

"I saw wrestling on the telly once," says Goyle, looking proud. "I never had a telly growing up or anything," he explains. "Parents hated Muggle stuff. I bought myself one a year or so ago and it distracts me no end, but it shows some awesome stuff. Do you watch the Great British Bake-Off?"

Dudley doesn't watch religiously, but he catches it now and then. He's found he works best with some white noise in the background, and he can glance up at it for quick study breaks too.

"Sometimes," he replies honestly. "You're a fan?"

"Everyone's sick to death of me talking about it. Funny how they never stop eating the stuff I bake for 'em, though, if baking's so boring."

The conversation stretches on, and it feels so natural that it hardly seems to require any effort on Dudley's part. They talk about where they went to school—the weird magical school in Scotland that Harry and all the others at the party went to, and Smeltings, which, with the benefit of hindsight, he gets wasn't an entirely normal place to be either. They compare the ways in which their parents were similar despite the wizarding set hating Muggles and the muggle set hating Wizards. Dudley discovers that Greg and Harry were about as friendly in school as Harry and Dudley were, and the warm, grounding, _hopeful_ thing that's been growing in Dudley's chest since he left that Sainsbury's with Harry's number solidifies, as if it's finally decided it belongs in him. If Harry and Greg can be friends after what sounds like a lot of nastiness, then maybe Harry and Dudley can be proper cousins. Family like family's meant to be.

 

4.

They spend their first date at the park, lying back on a large picnic blanket Dudley bought for the occasion, eating sandwiches made with bread Greg cooked himself, and brilliantly fluffy date scones with whipped cream after. It'd been Dudley who asked Greg out, his confidence boosted by the way Greg had taken his phone number that night at Harry's despite apparently _not owning a phone_ , and then called Dudley not two days later from a brand new one he'd gone and bought.

"I like those plants," Dudley says, observing the greenery in a nearby flowerbed. "I want to have plants in my house someday."

"I want to keep herbs," Greg tells him. "And hang up dried ones in the kitchen. My parents never let me in the kitchen as a child—that was a place for the house elves. But you can cook without being a servant."

"Of course you can! You can be a star at cooking. Think of all the top chefs in fancy restaurants—restaurants they _own_. Surely nobody's parents could look down on cooking like _that_."

Greg sighs, and Dudley hopes he hasn't made a mistake.

"My parents thought it was okay to eat at fancy restaurants, but not to cook at them."

"Oh. Sorry," Dudley says quietly, and reaches out for Greg's arm, which he lays his hand on apologetically.

"Don't be. You made a reasonable guess. Not your fault they weren't reasonable people."

"You're going to be a cook anyway, right?" Dudley ventures, his palm sweeping up the side of Greg's arm in a slow motion, feeling the soft texturing of Greg's dark hair as it goes.

Greg nods. "Yeah. I am. I tried being what they—what Dad especially—wanted me to be and it was the worst part of my life ever. So I don't care if they'd think it was a bad idea. I'm already apprenticing at the best bakery in Diagon Alley, and I'm going to own my own place one day."

One thing Dudley isn't sure about is whether Greg's parents are still... around. He speaks about them like they aren't, but if he said what happened to them at Harry's little party then he did it after Dudley had had too much wine to remember it the next day. He doesn't want to ask, though. Not right now, while the sky's pale blue above their heads and there are clouds drifting across it, sounds of birds and distant people making everything feel alive and vibrant.

"Where's Diagon Alley?" he changes the subject to something he hopes is happier.

"Harry's never taken you?" Greg asks, seeming confused. "It's the wizarding district in London. Where all the good magical shops and stuff are."

"Are Muggles actually allowed in?" Dudley asks. He tries to imagine a place where everyone around him was using magic, dressed all odd like some of Harry's friends were when he met them—Blaise Zabini especially. He imagines standing out like a sore thumb, everyone looking at him like they _know_ he's different, like Mum and Dad used to look at Harry.

"Not just any Muggles, of course," Greg explains, "or that'd defeat the whole purpose of it being a secret area. But Muggle who're with wizards come in all the time. Muggles who have wizarding kids, or wizarding partners—it'd be awfully hard for them if they couldn't come in."

"Are you offering to take me with you?" Dudley asks, not certain what he wants the answer to be. Getting along with witches and wizards is one thing, but being in a place full of them could be another, could be a thing he's not ready for yet—

But when Greg wraps one of his hands around Dudley's and says, "yeah, come to Diagon with me," Dudley knows he'd have been disappointed with anything else.

 

5.

Dudley still lives on campus, but he leaves each Friday afternoon for Greg's apartment and stays the weekend there. It's close enough to college to justify regular two-day stays, though day trips during the week would be pushing it.

Greg's apartment is so completely _him_ that Dudley pokes around fondly each time he arrives and Greg's not home from work yet. The photos on the walls, some moving and others static, of people Dudley's met: Draco, Harry, Ron, Blaise, Ginny, Luna—and people he hasn't: a stern pair of adults standing on either side of a very young Greg, another boy standing next to Greg and Draco with all three in school robes. Greg didn't look very happy when he was young, and Dudley doesn't like the reminder, but it helps him appreciate how much happier they all are now.

There are books stacked up vertically on bookshelves, often because they're too tall to slot in the normal way. Books on magic, books on cooking, books on magical cooking, and some extras on gardening, wine, beekeeping. There's a shelf specifically for fiction, and Greg's tastes range from pulp romance to _Lord of the Rings._ Here and there, little plants in pots stand in for book-ends.

In the kitchen, delicate crockery passed down by Greg's family mingles with the lumpy handmade clay mugs Greg and Dudley both made at a workshop. The mugs get far more use than the heirlooms. There's a rolling pin and a pair of baking trays on the bench today, a mixing bowl in the sink with tiny patches of dough still clinging to the edge, and a plastic contained with note stuck on top.

 _Dud,_ it says, _Sorry I'm late home again. There's pumpkin pie in the fridge if you want it._

Dudley goes for the biscuits first, pink-iced and sprinkled and sweet, but he holds the idea of pie happily in his mind for later as he sits down on the settee, switches Greg's telly on to a low volume and starts on his readings for the coming week of class. It actually became sort of interesting, the study, once he started imagining Greg or himself opening businesses of their own. Greg's bakery, of course. For himself, Dudley's begun imagining a plant nursery.

By the time Greg comes through the fireplace, arms laden with bakery leftovers, Dudley's too full of biscuits and pie to contemplate eating any of it, except perhaps the nice sourdough loaf.

"I need to eat something green tonight," he declares.

Greg laughs at him fondly. "I've got all the stuff for chicken and leek soup?"

" _Per_ fect," says Dudley, already imagining dipping a slice of dense bread into his bowl, the salt on his tongue, the satisfying fullness in his stomach that sugar never quite delivers. "Tell me what to do."

Dudley's not really helpful in the kitchen, but Greg is patient with him because he enjoys the company. While Greg does most of the work Dudley forages for turmeric in the cupboards, slices celery and goes out onto the tiny balcony to pick fresh chives.

"I've been thinking," says Greg, "about getting a bigger place. Somewhere with room for a real garden."

Dudley knows Greg's been saving, so if he's bringing up the possibility it must mean he's almost there. Dudley grins at him, proud.

"There are some open houses next weekend, close to school. I'd like it if you came with me."

"Close to school?" Dudley repeats, hoping his ears aren't deceiving him.

"It'd be nice to see you more," Greg shrugs, like this isn't even a big gesture. "And I can get to work and friends' houses by floo anyway."

Dudley puts down his knife and celery and moves to stand behind Greg, wrapping his strong arms around his boyfriend's strong middle, pressing a kiss to the back of his neck right about the tie of his apron.


End file.
